There is an increasing demand for light sources, e.g. luminaires and lamp shades, which can produce an interesting visual effect. An example of such a device is disclosed in US 2015/0021628 A1, which discloses a solid state light emitting device including one or more light affecting elements (e.g., of one or more light-transmissive, light-absorptive, light-reflective, and/or lumiphoric materials) formed on, over, or around at least one solid state light emitter, with the light affecting elements including multiple fused elements embodying plurality of dots, rods, or layers such as may be formed by three-dimensional (3-D) printing. Light affecting elements may be individually tailored to individual solid state light emitters, such as to yield different optical distributions for interactions between each specific emitter and its corresponding light affecting element.
An attractive property of this device is that the light affecting elements can be formed using 3-D printing, such that the light affecting elements can be manufactured in a fast and cost-effective manner. However, the light affecting elements do not provide an aesthetically pleasing effect, e.g. by manipulating different portions of a luminous output of a solid state lighting element in a different manner. Hence, there is a need for an optical component that can be manufactured in a cost-effective manner using 3-D printing techniques and is capable of generating an aesthetically pleasing visual effect.